Craig Pawson
Over the last 10 Championship games Craig Pawson has officiated, the average is 4.50 cards a match — 12% above the league average of 4.01. That splits 4.3 yellow and 0.2 red a game — a red in 2 of the 10. The home side sees more cards — 2.1 to 2.4 a game, in line with the league's 0.4 gap. 5+ cards landed in 70% of those games (7 of 10), from a 19.0% foul-to-booking rate. These are raw match figures from those games, not odds.
Match cards last 10 games
Career profile
The two numbers that matter are vs league — the multiplier the model applies to a player's booking chance — and conversion, the share of fouls Craig Pawson turns into bookings. Conversion, not the raw foul count, is where a referee's real card tendency lives. Career figures across every Championship season on record.
| Measure | Pawson | League avg |
|---|---|---|
| Cards / match | 4.50 | 4.01 |
| vs league | 1.12× | 1.00× |
| Foul-to-card conversion | 19.0% | 18.4% |
| Fouls / match | 23.7 | 21.9 |
| Red cards shown | 2 | — |
| Matches on record | 10 (1 in 25/26) | — |
Recent matches
The last 8 Championship games Craig Pawson took charge of — the actual card and foul counts a match-cards line settles on.
| Match | Score | Cards | Y | R | Fouls |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hull City v Stoke City1 Jan | 0–1 | 5 | 5 | 0 | 26 |
| Coventry City v West Brom18 Apr | 2–0 | 5 | 4 | 1 | 30 |
| Sunderland v Stoke City7 Dec | 2–1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 14 |
| Blackburn Rovers v Queens Park Rangers28 Sep | 2–0 | 6 | 5 | 1 | 27 |
| Blackburn Rovers v Southampton6 Apr | 0–0 | 5 | 5 | 0 | 25 |
| Leeds v Leicester23 Feb | 3–1 | 8 | 8 | 0 | 26 |
| Millwall v Blackburn Rovers8 May | 3–4 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 14 |
| Middlesbrough v Stoke City14 Mar | 1–1 | 5 | 5 | 0 | 25 |
Craig Pawson has officiated only 10 matches on our record — a thin sample. The model shrinks a thin referee tendency toward the league average and discounts its confidence until the evidence builds, so read the numbers above gently.
Frequently asked
How many cards does Craig Pawson give per game?
Craig Pawson averages 4.50 cards a game across 10 Championship matches — 12% above the league average of 4.01. That's a raw rate from only 10 matches, so the model shrinks it toward the league average rather than trusting it outright.
Is Craig Pawson a strict referee?
Slightly, yes. The honest measure is foul-to-card conversion — the share of fouls that become bookings — and Craig Pawson runs at 19.0% against a league average of 18.4%. Foul counts barely vary between officials; the rate at which a foul becomes a booking is where referees genuinely differ.
Does Craig Pawson's record change bet builder card prices?
It should. The referee is the single biggest factor in the to-be-carded market, and the appointment is public before kick-off — so a strict official on a combative player is the archetypal card edge. The player cards guide walks through exactly how the model turns a tendency like this into a price.
How reliable is Craig Pawson's card rate?
It rests on 10 career matches, still a thin sample — read it gently. The model shrinks a referee's tendency toward the league average when the sample is thin and discounts its own confidence for officials with young records, so a number like this never gets trusted beyond what the evidence earns.
Rates shown are figures from public match data for context; the model adds shrinkage, an opponent factor and de-vigging, and discounts its confidence for thin referee records, before flagging any card as value. 18+ — please gamble responsibly.